The present invention relates in general to an air filtration system, and more particularly, to a smokeless casino gaming table which provides controlled capture of cigarette smoke and the like, while providing a safe zone of purified air for the casino employee through redirection and dilution.
Casino and gambling parlors cater to many patrons who smoke. Many of the no smoking zones and laws that restrict smoking in public places do not apply to casinos. Most casino operators recognize the health aspects and exposure that second hand smoke creates for both their employees as well as their patrons. The casinos do not ban smoking probably because huge numbers of patrons still continue to smoke and making customers comfortable and allowing them to keep patrons at the tables for longer periods will increase business. Severe restrictions or banning smoking altogether would only affect their revenues or force customers to competitors who have a less restrictive smoking policy. The large numbers of foreign visitors who smoke and gamble and who do not see the social stigma or health concerns attached to smoking continue to be highly regarded customers to most casinos.
In addition to the casino customers, employees are constantly being exposed to second hand smoke, especially those who must stand near the tables while dealing for long periods at a stretch, or other employees who are in close proximity to the pit area. Patrons have the option of moving to another table or repositioning themselves away from the direction of the smoke if it becomes a problem. Disrupting the table or having people continually moving to another table is not the best situation for the house. The dealers usually do not have the option of relocating. The potential liability is that employees who are constantly exposed to an occupational risk or hazard (second hand smoke) could have potential grounds for a suit, if they were diagnosed with a respiratory ailment such as lung disease when they never smoked, but were exposed to smoke during the performance of their job duties.
Some casinos make an effort to exhaust huge amounts of air through their ventilation systems or condition it prior to recirculation back into public areas. However, these systems are mostly designed to provide a comfortable environment for patrons within the casino. This basically means that on hot humid days the air is cooled and dehumidified and on cold days heated and humidified. They have little effect on health concerns with what is being inhaled. Moving vast amounts of air is a costly measure from the standpoint of maintenance, energy consumption, filtration, equipment maintenance and replacement. However, it is basically the only thing currently being done and although expensive, serves mostly for comfort purposes as described previously.
The areas where the smoke is normally being generated, mostly at the gaming tables, in some cases must travel considerable distances before it is being exhausted. The current systems use vast amounts of air filters and carbon or charcoal for elimination of airborne particulate which is smoke laden. Increased air movement and recirculation of air is a costly undertaking and sometimes prohibitive based upon the capabilities of the air handling system and location of the intake and exhaust ducts. Excess exhaust of conditioned air is costly since all exhausted air must be replaced with further conditioned air, i.e., heated or cooled.
There are known a number of devices adapted to provide purified air within a localized work environment. For example, Skeist, U.S. Pat. No. 4,248,162 discloses a table having intake grills for withdrawal of pollutants from the surrounding environment such as smoke. The pollutants are purified by an electrostatic precipitator arranged underlying the table. The clean air is discharged through an underlying air diffuser at low velocity.
Paulson, U.S. Pat. No. 4,623,367 discloses an umbrella table including an eating surface and an umbrella supported by a hollow mast. Air is upwardly discharged through a plurality of openings within the table surface by means of a motor. Smoke rising with the discharged air is trapped within the umbrella and returned via the mast to a filter unit underlying the table adjacent the motor. In this manner, air is recirculated while being filtered for pollutants such as smoke.
Johnson, U.S. Pat. No. 5,085,231 discloses a hat having a motor in a frusto-conical portion for withdrawing contaminated air from the surrounding environment which is filtered by an overlying filter. Clean air is discharged through a directional component underlying the visor portion of the hat towards the wearer's face.
Hicks, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,160,517 discloses a chair having a base mounted grill for withdrawing polluted air such as smoke from the surrounding environment. The polluted air is filtered by, for example, a HEPA (High Efficiency Particulate Air) filter within the chair base and discharged by a blower. In one embodiment, the clean air is discharged from the seat back towards the front of the chair. This creates a relatively quiescent vortex of purified air in the zone above the seat. In theory, contaminants in the vicinity of the chair are separated from the vortex by the relatively fast moving air stream which entrains them and carries them away.
The aforementioned air purification units suffer from a number of notable disadvantages. In particular, neither the hat in Johnson nor the chair in Hicks, et al. will perform the function that they were intended for, because they cannot provide adequate air movement to move enough airborne particulate without being impractical or uncomfortable for the user. In Skeist, an electrostatic filtering system is employed. The byproduct produced by electrostatic charging, i.e., ozone, is typically more detrimental than the smoke itself. Electrostatic charging, in fact, does not eliminate the gasses associated with cigarette smoke, only the particles. The efficiency of electrostatic charging diminishes as the unit is operated and continues diminishing as the plates continuously build up with particulate matter. The gasses, mostly ammonia are continually passed through, making this system a very inefficient and ineffective filtering system. In Paulson, there is no ability to separate the contaminated air from the filtered purified air to function as an air barrier. Accordingly, it can be appreciated that there is an unsolved need for an air filtration system which provides controlled capture of airborne pollutants while providing a safe zone of purified air for one or more individuals present within the contaminated environment.